Two More U.S. Citizens Seek to Join Class Action Lawsuit Challenging Immigration Detainers

November 30, 2011

This morning in Chicago, Illinois, Judge Robert Dow considered the request of two U.S. citizens, Sergey Mayorov and Nicholas Taylor, to join a class action lawsuit challenging the use of immigration detainers. Another U.S. citizen, Jose Jimenez Moreno, is already a plaintiff in that lawsuit. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) wrongly subjected all three U.S. citizens to “detainers” or “immigration holds”, which instruct local police to detain individuals who ICE suspects have immigration violations. ICE never interviewed or spoke with the individuals before lodging the detainers against them. The lawsuit filed by Heartland Alliance’s National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC) challenges the detainer process, arguing that the ICE detainer procedures are unlawful and unconstitutional.

“This is a travesty of justice,” said NIJC National Litigation Coordinator Mark Fleming. “ICE under this administration uses Secure Communities and detainers to target hundreds of thousands of people annually, but doesn’t seem interested in taking any steps to ensure quality control and due process for the people ensnared in the system.”

This afternoon, the House Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement will hold a hearing on the Secure Communities program, which has expanded rapidly throughout the country. Immigration detainers are a key component of the program.

The plaintiffs in the Jimenez Moreno case, as well as Mr. Mayorov and Mr. Taylor, are represented by Linda Coberly, Ray Perkins, Keith R. Pozulp, and Nicole A. Kozdron of Winston & Strawn LLP, and Mark Fleming, Charles Roth, and Claudia Valenzuela of the National Immigrant Justice Center. The case’s name is Jimenez Moreno, et. al. v. Napolitano, no. 1:11-cv-05452.